Parent: School district's automated call refers to student as N-word

Nicomi Stewart says she received the call after her daughter, Nicarri, missed a day of class at Edison Career and Technology High School. (WHAM)

ROCHESTER, N.Y. (WHAM) - A mother is demanding answers from the Rochester City School District after she says an automated call referred to her daughter as the n-word.

Nicomi Stewart says she received the call after her daughter, Nicarri, missed a day of class at Edison Career and Technology High School.

To make sure she heard correctly, Stewart let the next call from the school go to voicemail so she could record the message.

She and family members agree the wording was clear: “This is Edison Career and Technology High School. Your daughter, N****r, has missed period one on…,” the automated voice read.

“I didn’t have words to say at the moment,” Stewart said. “I was like, wow, am I really hearing you correctly, did the machine just say this?”

“It was unbelievable. I was shocked. I was disgusted. I was upset.”

Stewart says she told an administrator at Edison about the call, and says she was told her daughter’s name would be removed from the automated calling system. But she says she received two additional calls with the same pronunciation.

“It’s disrespectful and it’s degrading. I don’t even use that word in my house, so why is my child being called this?”

To add to the confusion, Stewart says similar automated calls last year pronounced her daughter’s name correctly.

After multiple calls to the district, and a week and a half with no explanation, Stewart’s sister put a recording of the call on social media – hoping it would result in a response.

“I just want her name to be put in the system correctly, and they need to apologize for this,” Stewart said.

WHAM-TV reached out to RCSD and is still waiting for a response.

Rochester Board of Education President Van White said he would set up an interview with the district’s IT department to provide an explanation of what happened.